—Natasha's POV—
The moon was no longer a celestial body; it was a predator. Each night, it swelled larger, brighter, more oppressively present in the sky, its silver light feeling less like illumination and more like a searchlight pinning me to the earth. As its gravitational pull intensified, so did the catastrophic war being waged within the confines of my own skin. The half-mark was not a scar but a fault line, and the moon's energy was the tectonic pressure, causing constant, violent tremors.
My existence became a cycle of torturous symptoms. The Flash Heat Waves: They would strike without warning, a solar flare erupting from the epicenter of the mark on my neck. One moment I'd be huddled in a sweater, chilled to the bone; the next, I was clawing at my collar, my skin slick with a su
